Zalora – Fashion Based Ecommerce

Zalora, founded in 2012, is leading the internet fashion industry webs in Southeast Asia. It is Asia’s fastest growing fashion based e-commerce website. Zalora is Singapore’s ASOS (Britain online retailer) operating in 8 countries including Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Thailand, Philippines and Brunei. It offers a wide collection of more than 500 national and international designers and brands. Customers can market from hundreds and thousands of goods across women’s and men’s fashion apparel, accessories, shoes, bags and beauty products online. ViSenze visual technology allows Zalora to ensure customer satisfaction that they have an equal or even better shopping experience to that of offline users in terms of product colour, size, shape, style and other attributes. Patrick Steinbrenner Regional Director at Zalora South East Asia says: “ViSenze truly espouses a blend of innovation and smart technology. The ViSearch product is simple to understand, easy to use and delivers the results we need.”

Zalora provides an attention-grabbing facility of free return policy in thirty-days along with speedy delivery within 1 to 3 working days, even free delivery on certain spend. For customer easiness, it introduces multiple payment methods like PayPal, MasterCard, VISA, CIMB Clicks and Cash on delivery. At Zalora, shopping is easy and affordable; a team of professional consultants is available 24 hours per day for customer support. According to the company’s report it has experienced “stellar sales records.”

History

Zalora, being a part of Zalora Group, was established in late 2011 or early 2012 by Rocket Internet GmbH; it is Asia Pacific’s top group of online fashion retailers with The Iconic in New Zealand and Australia. Zalora’s managing director Michele Ferrario says: “Our company is one of the fastest growing e-commerce companies in Southeast Asia and has bright prospects. “It is an honor for us that investors of such great repute have invested into an e-commerce company as young as Zalora.”

Founded in 2007, Rocket Internet GmbH is a leading online incubator for the development of innovative internet companies. Its mission is to become world’s best internet platform outside USA and China. Its ventures include Zalora, FoodPanda, PricePanda, Wimdu, Lazada, Lamudi and many more.

Zalora’s mission is to provide passionate customers a dynamic, ever-evolving and passionate business environment. Here are some services that Zalora offers:

Intuitive operation and easy navigation

It is an easy to use and fine laid out online shopping store. During customers’ first visit to Zalora, they are guided step by step to complete purchase without being hectic.

Safe and simple shopping

Once the selected items are in personal cart, customers are requested to choose from safe payment options. Payment can simply be made via invoice, prepayment, direct debit or credit card. After the completion of an order successfully, customer service team informs customers the current status for their order. Each order requires an online tracking number through which buyers can follow their orders till delivery.

Fast shipping

Shopping at Zalora is often called flash shipping because orders are usually shipped out the same day of their confirmation.

Free Delivery

Customers can avail free delivery package when the minimum target size of bucket RM75 is achieved. Free return within 30 days of purchase is accepted especially in the case of shoes because they might not fit in.

Personal and comprehensive service

An extensive range of speedy, personal and professional services are available to help buyers. Zalora has an engineering team and a technology soul. Consumers can enjoy customer service hotline or live chat under the heading “footwear and fashion” to address their queries to experts.

Product range

Zalora hoards big brand names such as Adidas, American Apparel, Ray Ban, Rip Curl, Nike, River Island, New Look and many more so customers do not have to exhaust themselves of searching other places for their desired items.

Membership

For making purchase via Zalora, buyers have to create their personal account by submitting a simple membership which includes information regarding name, contact number, gender and email address through which they can receive Zalora’s exclusive offers and updates about new arrivals and discounts. Customers can get $15 voucher when they subscribe to the company’s newsletter.

Revenue

In 2014, Zalora’s revenue was €117 million ($140.4 million) almost 70% increment from 2013 level. Its net losses included €61.7 million (in 2013) to €68.1 million (in 2014). Its GMV grew 80% in last year. Now, Zalora has completed US$238 million in four funding rounds to profitably flourish in Asia starting from $2 million annualized income. It is an honour and miracle as well. In funding round 3, Zalora receives $112 million per private equity round and $100 million per series C round. Zalora’s first investment was secured by a German company Internet Rocket which owned Zalora, another lead investor is Access Industries. JP Morgan, Investment AB Kinnevik, Scopia Capital, Summit Partners and Tengelmann Ventures are also Zalora’s funding sources. Zalora has sucked up US$238,000,000 in funding to date, and claims more than 17 million monthly visits across ASEAN at the end of the year. Next year the South Asian fashion market will be worth around US$77.1 billion (€ 70 billion). 25 % of its revenues come from mobile commerce. The company says its app is a chief lifestyle and most popular iOS app in countries it serves. The company has achieved the status of world’s best million order deliveries.

Competitors

Zalora’s competing e-commerce fashion websites are Ava which aims to be Philippines’ “online retail therapy, done right”, Berrybenka Indonesia, the site sells over 1000 brands and Smooch The Label Singapore is online fashion website for women. Chon.vn Vietnam clocked 80,000 visits whereas Zalora still got the lead of 2.2 million desktop visits in 2015. What differentiates Zalora from its competitos is its customer-centric-policy. It has 8,000 sq. ft. local warehouses in 8 countries to speed up deliveries so that buyers get their orders in time. Bangladesh and China have become the world’s biggest garment manufacturer but here is an advantage which places Zalora above other fashion retailers which is its ideal location in Asia.

Zalora has partnered with top fashion designers of the world like Rizalman, Melinda Looi and Jovian Mandagie who work with Zalora by designing their collections exclusively for it. The company has entered in online retail partnership with Topshop Topman, Globe Telecom and Sephora.Drina Chee, Regional Marketing Director at Sephora Asia Pte Ltd commented, “Given Zalora’s massive reach and expertise when it comes to fashion and beauty e-commerce, we felt they were the right partner to introduce Sephora to online shoppers in Southeast Asia. With so many people connected to the internet in this part of the world, it makes sense to bring Sephora online here.”Mr Tito Costa, Zalora’s regional managing director says: “Tengelmann is one of the largest German retailers with thousands of stores. It has expertise such as inventory management, which can help us become the largest e-commerce company in the region.”

For those who want to be a part of Zalora can visit http://www.zalora.sg/careers/ to apply online for the job in any country where it works. Job type can be standard, experienced or internship.

Zalora’s official website is http://worldwide.zalora.com where customers can find their relevant product at one site by selecting country first or they can connect with Zalora at Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, WeChat, Google+ and Youtube. Customer service hours are 9am to 6 pm daily. For any issues regarding order shipment, payment, return policy, voucher application and more, buyers can email at customer@my.zalora.com or they can call at customer service number 03-2035 6622 (Malaysia),+62 21 29490100 (Indonesia), +65 3157 5555 (Singapore), +852 3999 4200 (Hong Kong), +84 1900 1008 (Vietnam), +66 1639 (Thailand), +63 2 858 0702 (Philippines) and +032035 6622 (Brunei). Zalora provides same services in every country, it offers 8% commission for existing customers and 30% for new customers on first purchase.

To sum up, I like to add that those who join Asia’s leading online fashion retailer company Zalora can get